Michigan: Cup qualifying

17 August 2013

Penske Racing's Joey Logano claimed his first pole position of the year and will start Sunday's Pure Michigan 400 NASCAR Sprint Cup race at the two-mile Michigan International Speedway put him on the front row alongside his recent predecessor behind the wheel of the #22, Kurt Busch.

"Track position is really big when you come to Michigan and we have a really good Ford in race trim and I feel like it is really good," said Logano after his run. "I think we have a shot to win this weekend. We have to be smart and play the right strategy but we should be starting up toward the front and hopefully we can stay there most of the day."

Logano's time of 35.303s (203.949mph) is a new track qualifying record at Michigan, beating the previous record set in June 2012 by Marcos Ambrose who posted speeds of 203.241mph and is the ninth-fastest pole-winning lap in NASCAR Sprint Cup Series history. It's the 13th time a new qualifying record has been set this season since the introduction of the new Gen-6 car.

This was Logano's sixth career pole in 170 NASCAR Sprint Cup Series races and his first time taking point for a Cup race at Michigan. He was just 0.044s ahead of Kurt Busch in the #78 Furniture Row Racing car, who is pushing hard to make it into the Chase in the four races remaining before Richmond.

“I was real happy with our lap," said Busch. "We tuned it up a little bit from practice and it's really neat to overlay exactly what we did here in June, when we were outside pole and try to improve on that.

"The pace today was just quick," he continued. "It was just an extreme pace that the qualifying simulations were showing us. I shot for a 35.35s in my mind for a lap time and ran a 35.347s. I thought it would be good enough for the pole, but Logano just hit it perfectly and if I had to say where we lost a little bit of speed was maybe my entry to Turn 2. It was just a little conservative making sure I didn't over drive it.

"It's really cool to be in position on Fridays and to have that shot at going for the pole because it's not every week where you're showing up having shots at sitting on the pole," he added. "So, thanks to the guys and everybody that's working hard."

Jimmie Johnson will start alongside Mark Martin on row two, with Jeff Burton starting on row three alongside Juan Pablo Montoya. Scott Riggs was the sole driver to miss out on the race after Landon Cassill qualified for the 43-car grid via owner points.